Mass use of guided bombs driving Russian advances, says Ukraine
theguardian.com
theguardian.com
(Russia already published it's keen to keep going. You can discuss whether that's just posturing or not, but that part's public)
When someone argues it would be a huge escalation for the US, UK and France to directly defend Ukrainian territory against Russia's attacks, they should explain how the same nations directly defending Israeli territory from Iran's attacks is constructively and strategically different.
The other would almost certainly end up being called WW3, and would likely involve at least a limited nuclear exchange.
The reason it was “de-escalatory”: It helped Iran prove what it sought to prove: no AD in the world will stop their missiles from getting through. For Israel it provided the face-saving “99.9%”.
Also, the Ukraine situation has no Jordan, Iraq, accessible ocean (ask the Turks about that) to operate from.
https://vatniksoup.com/en/nuclear-threats/
Don't let the ridiculous, empty threats of Russia warp your perceptions of what's possible.
This is what Russia would like you to believe (and to repeat on their behalf). Much of Russian propaganda is aimed at instilling fear in target populations. The goal is to demoralize their adversaries' civilians in order to undermine support, hence political and military will for opposing them.
Russia has been dictating the terms and rattling the saber with nuclear threats, etc. from the start. Initially, Putin wanted people to believe he was so irrational that he'd use nukes at any provocation. But, the fact that he threatened instead of simply using them was the clearest sign that he's rational and doesn't want this war to escalate. The worst possible thing for Russia is for the West to fully commit.
In short, if using nukes was advantageous to Russia, they'd have already used them. On the conventional front, they need to feel some actual risk. Otherwise, they commit to an ongoing war of attrition where theirs is the bigger population/force and it's Ukrainian cities that are being leveled. Time is on Russia's side.
So, it's already a war. The West either wins it or loses it, and you don't win on your enemy's terms. Aiming for a stalemate and "negotiated peace" (which Russia won't honor in any case) is extraordinarily costly, especially when the war is being fought exclusively on your (or your ally's) territory. i.e., it's a loss.
The West needs to realize it's in a war and go on the offensive, politically and militarily. Redeploy Russia's frozen assets to support Ukraine's reconstruction, defense, and war-fighting capability. Provide more offensive weapons to go after military targets inside of Russia. Re-establish air-superiority and consider establishing NATO no-fly zones around civilian population centers. In addition to changing the military situation, strong moves like these will signal that the West is resolved to a degree that will dramatically raise the risks for Russia, ultimately prompting a recalculation.
Downvoting should be limited to text that detracts from the conversation, not used simply because the downvoter disagrees with what is written. (If you disagree, then reply with a rebuttal. Lazily clicking downvote helps nobody).
Going into Ukraine purely as a "defensive" effort would create another indefinite war. And maybe that's the right thing, but right now a lot of Americans aren't prepared to commit to that. They'll send money, and weapons, but not put people in harm's way without a clear indicator of what they have to do to get out.
The question is which is the least bad mistake? Everything from attacking Putin directly, to doing nothing, to weapons for Ukraine, to NATO soldiers fighting in Ukraine.
Boots on the ground is never popular with the American public. Letting Ukraine hang on with life support while running out Putin's life is.
More than that, the idea that they can invade a country and the country's allies shouldn't enter the country to help defend because it would result in a "nuclear strike" ends where, exactly?
It's a completely irrational posture that Russia would love the world to assume. They could literally take all of Europe without firing a shot.
Maybe we need a stronger definition of “ally”. The USA is in a treaty with 32 member states that obligates boots-on-the-ground. Ukraine isn’t one of them. The line of where a country’s obligations to help an “ally” is defined in terms like that.
Allyship does not require NATO membership. Clearly, the U.S. and NATO members consider Ukraine an ally.
https://youtu.be/iBFYNl9i3_8?t=1539
He then shares info from some original sources. He's been involved in Ukraine for 26+ years and spends a lot of time there.
The question is does the West have any guts here? Seeing Germany's chancellor pandering there this week suggests not
The west cannot play this at all, especially right now.
The EU population (no matter how much our politicians saw "we can do this!") is already financially under strain from the high inflation, high energy bills, stagnant wages, high living costs and high interest rates, hence the shift to the anti-establishment right wing politicians all over the EU.
The last thing they would want right now is another war with China.
This is a failure to understand the situation—China’s restraint so far. And that for the West such actions come with consequences now.
China’s (again, rather limited) involvement will not decrease. There is much the West can do to increase it.
As Chinese FM Wang expressed today: The rest of the world is not fooled by the West’s rhetoric. They see the hypocrisy and the warmongering, they understand the true intent.
And again. Unlike the West, China continues to show much restraint. Less than it used to, true. But they have quite a bit of room left to escalate. The West has not. Not where it doesn’t get painful and dangerous.
Which is probably where we’re going. So be it.
Similar footage came out in 2014 when Russia annexed Crimea and the west just shrugged their shoulders and put sanctions on Crimea then kept trading with Russia like nothing happened.
A trillion dollars would go a long way to solving poverty around the world. We'd be loved instead of despised.
Alas, the wrong folks are in charge, and they're not interested in diplomacy. No profit in it.
"once you have paid him the Dane-geld, You never get rid of the Dane": in the long term, or even the medium, bribing your enemies to not attack you does not work. The Danegeld was one such system from when the "Vikings" were invading northeast England round about the year 1000AD.
Equally applicable.
> Russia’s air force appears to have been a key player in turning the tide of the war in the Kremlin’s favour in recent months at a time when Ukraine’s air defences are at a low ebb.
But also:
> The Ukrainian analysts write: “Russia uses UMPC bombs primarily to hit its targets in frontline areas, minimising the possibility of its own aircraft being hit by Ukrainian air defences. In just one week, from 26 February to 3 March, Russia used more than 500 [guided aerial bombs with a mounted UMPC]”.
I do think you're right that the counter is to shoot down the planes dropping them, but my understanding is that the way you'd do that is with fighters, not GBAD. If Ukraine had stealth fighters with Meteors patrolling close to the frontlines then the bomb missions would be very dangerous. If they do not have any fighters at all then they are cakewalks, barring Patriot stuntwork. If they have an exhaustible supply of F-16s with AMRAAMs then it is difficult to predict.
The lack of an effective fighter component in the integrated air-defense system is a problem though, no?
If their air defence was even weaker, yes, the Russians could just gravity bomb them. But they haven't reached that point yet.
We certainly have the missile technology to shoot these bombs down, if necessary, but there's no percentage in deploying expensive/limited missiles to do that if you can take down or deter the launch platforms.